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[“Most patriarchal fathers in our nation do not use physical violence to keep their sons in check; they use various techniques of psychological terrorism, the primary one being the practice of shaming. Patriarchal fathers cannot love their sons because the rules of patriarchy dictate that they stand in competition with their sons, ready to prove that they are the real man, the one in charge. In his essay “Finding the Light and Keeping It in Front of Me,” Bob Vance describes walking behind his father as a boy longing to connect but knowing intuitively that no connection was possible: “Something inhibits me from asking him for what I need. I know, if a very young boy can intuit such things, that I am left out of his world and am somehow forbidden to ask him what I can do to have him take me into his world, to hold me playfully or tenderly. The rift begins here. This is the earliest memory I have of my father.”

To the patriarchal dad, sons can only be regarded as recruits in training, hence they must constantly be subjected to sadomasochistic power struggles designed to toughen them up, to prepare them to maintain the patriarchal legacy. As sons they inhabit a world where fathers strive to keep them in the one-down position; as patriarchs in training they must learn how to assume a one-up role. Real explains:

Sustaining relationships with others requires a good relationship to ourselves. Healthy self-esteem is an internal sense of worth, that pulls one neither into “better than” grandiosity nor “less than” shame…. Contempt is why so many men have such trouble staying connected. Since healthy self-esteem—being neither one up nor down—is not yet a real option, and since riding in the one-down position elicits disdain, in oneself and in others, most men learn to hide the chronic shame that dogs them…running from their own humanity and from closeness to anyone else along with it.

This flight from closeness is most intense in the lives of adolescent boys because in that liminal zone between childhood and young adulthood they are experiencing a range of emotions that leave them feeling out of control, fearful that they will not measure up to the standards of patriarchal masculinity. Suppressed rage is the perfect hiding place for all these fears.”]

bell hooks, The Will To Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love

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I wonder what Mae got up to this Harfest 🎃🍂

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As previously mentioned, I am very happily a parental figure to two kids that I played no part in conceiving, which means for those keeping score that I got to jump straight from Maiden to Crone in something of an accelerated program.

Anyway, these kids are semi-obviously not my biological progeny in that they have their dad’s spectacular eyebrows that I covet every day while I am resentfully drawing mine on, and their gorgeous, ethereal, very very very blonde hair from their mom’s side.

So like, we’re walking the kids through the grocery store parking lot to buy dinner the other day, and a woman stops in the crosswalk to look at me, look at my boyfriend, look at the kids, and then loudly ask “WHERE’D THAT BLONDE COME FROM?”

And I’m just like momentarily frozen, like, do I have to explain to this biddy “hey yeah these aren’t my biological kids but they are my boyfriend’s, but rest assured that the divorce was extremely amicable and also i’m a solid stable fixture in their life and they actually take after their mom’s family-“

and then my boyfriend, (who is for the record a fucking stud) eliminated all that worry by saying (very sexily and without breaking his stride in the least):

“The mailman.”

and ooooooooo her indignant faaaaaace i love him so much

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scurvy has got to have one of the biggest disease/treatment coolness gaps of all time. like yeah too much time at sea will afflict you with a curse where your body starts unraveling and old wounds come back to haunt you like vengeful ghosts. unless☝️you eat a lemon

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Emberiza fucata [ホオアカ,Chestnut-eared bunting]

すぐに田圃の潜ってしまうので手強かったです😓

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death of subcultures and death of third places are directly connected and you can’t convince me otherwise

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good shirt from the market today

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Haven't figured out a politic way to word this but before saying someone/thing "makes you uncomfortable" please ask yourself this important question: is it any of your fucking business

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i think about this no kidding once a month at least since i first read it in passing and for the life of me i cant stop my bones going cold by the time i reach the end of the paragraph i stay with that full stop for hours

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Every day is a reason to celebrate 🥂🥳

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it's annoying that video games disable achievements when you install mods. i DID kill alduin who cares if thomas the tank engine was there